Ramblings and webcomics from LeEMS
So, it is the month for Inktober, and also (I just found out) Drawlloween.
Inktober is a pen and ink picture a day for a month challenge. I have done Inktober before, I’ve even Halloween themed it. Since I usually draw for pen and ink, it suits my style.
Drawlloween has no such conditions on how you draw, but does tell you what to draw.
I’m a little behind in scanning and posting, but I have been drawing. I will be posting catch-ups today…follow the posts with the tag #DRAWLLOWEEN.
I almost forgot, February 1st is hourly comic day, and February 1st is this Saturday. Even though I’ve done a few 24 hour comic day and Mini comics day, I’ve always missed/forgotten about hourly comic day. Well, not this year! If hourly comic day is news to you there is an overview on know your meme.
Here’re John Campbell describing The Hourly Comic:
HOURLY COMIC DAY
hello on february first a bunch of people make a journal comic every hour they are awake. and then they show these journal comics to other people on the internet
we will see how different people spend their day.
THE GUIDELINES:
-for every hour that you are awake on february first (that’s february first for whatever time zone you happen to be in), you make a comic describing something about the past hour. maybe you ate some cereal? maybe your mother called and screamed long and low until her voice gave out
-say you wake up at 7am. make a comic some time before it becomes 8am. then after 8am, make a comic before it becomes 9am. it is pretty simple.
I’ve trumpeted National Novel Writing Month a ton on this here blog. I have enjoyed every year I have participated. Not only have they created an environment of encouragement and commiseration for people who may have never ventured into writing otherwise (my Mother), but they do great things to encourage youth to write as well! We all have stories and NaNoWriMo helps us tell them.
Ok, that was way thoughtful and somber – point is Yay! I don’t have to wait for November to embrace that feeling again. For the first time ever there will be a National Novel Writing Month Spring Writing Marathon on April 13th. Your marathon can be editing, writing fresh, continuing a story, anything. Just pledge what you can, ’cause you want to support the awesome stuff NaNoWriMo does, and then hunker down on the 13th and write write write! I did and will.
It was touch and go for a while, and I didn’t even come prepared with extra printer ink, but I did it! Five copies of ‘The Secret is Murder.’ I need to figure out what I’m going to do with it – the copies, and where on the Bean I’m going to post the scans. Here’s a little preview to wet your appetites:
I marked my calendar, but I still lost track of time and Mini-Comics Day 2013 is on March 24th!
I don’t know what I’m going to do! I have no earthly idea….wait, I’m having an idea. Maybe I’ll actually be ready for Mini Comics Day. Except, I did not get extra color ink for my printer. Hmmm, have a day to fix that though.
Over on the 24-hour comics day blog the 24-Hour Comics Day 2013 date announced. It is October 5th. I love the spontaneity of dreaming up a comic and executing it in one day. It is a trial, but I love what I’ve come up with so far. I’m already looking forward to it.
My first: Death goes to Octoberfest
Last year: Nightmare
24 hour comics day is coming! I need to come up with an idea – though, of course, nothing more than an idea. The challenge is to plan, draw, and finish a 24 page comic in 24 hours. There can be no story written, no layouts sketched, nothing until the big day. How it’s finished is up to the artist. I did my usual last year (pencil sketches inked with a grey pallet). I’m trying to decide if I’m up for that this year. I can still remember how my shoulder felt afterwards. Why must I mouse and draw with the same hand?
Since I’m doing the challenge from home I will be posting updates and comic pages as I go this Saturday. Thank goodness I finally have a correct installation of webcomic (is, by the by, a fabulous comic displaying wordpress plugin, with which my recent trials were probably all my fault).
I was having some trouble thinking of what I was going to draw for inktober. I mean, a theme isn’t required, but it’s nice, right? I’m not sure if I have a theme yet, but a month full of houses would be very useful later on.
Inktober is coming – a month long celebration of artists drawing in ink. I’ve happily watched through a couple years of Jake Parker’s Inktobers and seen other artists I follow fall in line with brush and pen. This will be the first year I give it a try. No pencils, no erasers, just ink on paper, a drawing a day, all October long. Even on 24 hour comics Day October 20th. So keep your fingers crossed for me and check back. Check back everyday. 🙂
Hey you. So, I submitted to another anthology, keep your fingers crossed for me. The call is still open too for the Unsolved Mysteries Anthology – comics about non-fiction disappearances and unexplained phenomena. I drew mine up on the Vanished Lighthousemen of Eilean Mor (fabulous article by Mike Dash). I found some crazy theory about the disappearances, like murder-suicide, viking ghosts, and aliens – but it’s the details and lack there of that inspired the theories in the first place, right? So my little story is all about the facts.
The ingredients from the pantry inventory: farfalle pasta (bowtie), alfredo sauce, a can of quartered artichoke hearts and crumbly sausage.
The idea: brown the sausage and then mix all the stuff together after cooking and bake (to take the jarred alfredo sauce taste out of the alfredo). Unfortunately the alfredo sauce surprised me with a use by date of January 2012. I wasn’t willing to tempt fate.
The solution: cook other ingredients as planned and assemble with goat cheese and parmesan (found in the fridge). It worked out pretty well and I’m only slightly irked that the alfredo sauce expired under my watch.